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Why should public agencies support open source projects?

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For some it’s obvious that public agencies should be using open source software solutions. We owe it to the tax payers to be good stewards of their money. When we can, we should use free software. But what about being more than just users and actually contributing to OSS projects?

I came across a great post that lays out the rationale for participating as contributors in open source projects. It’s from Stephen Hedges, the director of the Nelsonville Public Library answering questions about their decision to use Koha, an open source circulation software package.

From the article,

“It’s important that libraries do not look on Open Source as free software that they just download, press a button, and all their problems will magically be solved. Open Source requires just as much commitment as commercial software – you still only get what you pay for. Libraries should approach Open Source with the notion that they will commit a lot of staff time to understanding the code and how the software does its job. They should also be ready to commit financial resources as well, just as if they were still paying annual license fees for commercial software. The difference is, with commercial software a big portion of the license fee goes to research and development over which the library has no control, while with Open Source that same money can fund the development of the software modules that the library really wants.”

also…
“I expect that an initial investment of about $10,000 will save us about $10,000 every year, beginning in 2003.”

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